[This unedited press release is made available courtesy of Gamasutra and its partnership with notable game PR-related resource GamesPress.]

Salt Lake City, Utah – November 6, 2013 –
Tactical Haptics, a technology startup, is bringing a new breed of
touch feedback to market through
Reactive Grip™. Their Kickstarter campaign will be
used to build a developer and researcher community around creating
the most realistic and tangible touch feedback experiences in games
and virtual reality. This unique haptic technology will be
made available by funding Reactive Grip game controller development
kits through Kickstarter.

Their Kickstarter campaign also seeks to engage
future users of the advanced haptic technology who want to
show game developers and peripheral makers alike that they want
more than buzzing and vibration from their video game and virtual
reality experiences. Backer support from these future users
will provide hope that Reactive Grip could someday be integrated
into engaging game franchises such as Call of Duty, Battlefield,
Elder Scrolls, Fallout, or Left for Dead.

The emerging startup will work together with these enthusiasts
to deliver a new level of realism and physical connection to games.
Tactical Haptics plans to enable the Reactive Grip in a variety of
game types to let players feel the impact of a sword, the tug of a
fish in a fishing game, or the kick of a gun in their favorite
shooter. Support will also be given to enable hobbyist
projects such as tele-operating a battle-bot or feeling the
physical interactions within a virtual sculpting or modeling
application.

Reactive Grip touch feedback works by mimicking the friction and
shear forces that we feel in the real world when holding an object
or touching a surface. This is accomplished by measuring the
movements of the player’s hand and actuating small sliding
plates in the grip of the controller to recreate the friction and
shear forces you’d expect when holding an actual object such
as a sword, slingshot, or fishing rod. It is called Reactive Grip
feedback because the controller reacts to a player’s actions
and motions in the virtual world.

The first Reactive Grip controller prototype was developed prior
to the Game Developers Conference (GDC) 2013, where it was
demonstrated to the public for the first time – in many cases
to folks that had just tried the Oculus Rift. Players trying
the controller immediately asked when this kind of feedback would
be integrated into their favorite shooter, flight simulator, or
RPG. Reactive Grip could also be used to provide touch
feedback in Augmented Reality, in tele-robotic interfaces, to guide
the blind, for rehabilitation, or for other medical
applications.

Tactical Haptics was founded by Professor William Provancher in
2013. The objective of this company is to commercialize haptic
feedback technologies, including several technologies developed in
Dr. Provancher's University of Utah Laboratory, the
Haptics and Embedded Mechatronics
Lab. The company's initial focus is on commercializing the use
of Reactive Grip touch feedback in the fields of virtual reality,
augmented reality, and gaming. Reactive Grip touch feedback
creates engaging physical interaction in virtual environments that
significantly improves upon the realism of interactions compared to
“rumble” vibration feedback. Future applications
include navigation aids for the blind, minimally invasive surgery,
and upper limb rehabilitation.